Thousands of our American ancestors were killed by vampires in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. By 1800, vampires could be blamed for nearly one-quarter of all deaths in North America and vampires remained the leading cause of death throughout the nineteenth century. This vampire did not resemble the clever Count Dracula of Bram Stoker's imagination; this vampire's cloak of invisibility was its smallness. It was so tiny that it could not be seen with the naked eye, which may explain its success as a mysterious killer. The mystery was solved in 1882, the year that Edward Koch announced his discovery of the tuberculosis bacillus. America's vampires actually were—germs!
Showing posts with label Mercy Brown. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Mercy Brown. Show all posts
The Great New England Vampire Panic
Two hundred years after the Salem witch trials, farmers became convinced that their relatives were returning from the grave to feed on the living
Children playing near a hillside gravel mine found the first graves. One ran home to tell his mother, who was skeptical at first—until the boy produced a skull.
Because this was Griswold, Connecticut, in 1990, police initially thought the burials might be the work of a local serial killer named Michael Ross, and they taped off the area as a crime scene. But the brown, decaying bones turned out to be more than a century old. The Connecticut state archaeologist, Nick Bellantoni, soon determined that the hillside contained a colonial-era farm cemetery. New England is full of such unmarked family plots, and the 29 burials were typical of the 1700s and early 1800s: The dead, many of them children, were laid to rest in thrifty Yankee style, in simple wood coffins, without jewelry or even much clothing, their arms resting by their sides or crossed over their chests.
Except, that is, for Burial Number 4.
The Words on Nelly's Tombstone
Originally printed in Yankee Magazine, January 1994
The villagers of Exeter, Rhode Island, knew that farmer George Brown had a problem. First, in 1883 his wife, Mary, succumbed to a mysterious illness. Six months later, his 20-year-old daughter, Mary Olive, also fell ill and died. Within the next several years, his 19-year-old daughter, Mercy, was also dead, and George's teenage son, Edwin, a healthy lad who worked as a store clerk, became suddenly frail and sick. The village doctor informed George that "consumption" was taking his family. But the country folk of Exeter had another explanation.
The villagers of Exeter, Rhode Island, knew that farmer George Brown had a problem. First, in 1883 his wife, Mary, succumbed to a mysterious illness. Six months later, his 20-year-old daughter, Mary Olive, also fell ill and died. Within the next several years, his 19-year-old daughter, Mercy, was also dead, and George's teenage son, Edwin, a healthy lad who worked as a store clerk, became suddenly frail and sick. The village doctor informed George that "consumption" was taking his family. But the country folk of Exeter had another explanation.
Was she a victim ... or a vampire?
Written By KAREN LEE ZINER
The secret lies buried in Historical Cemetery No. 22, behind Exeter's Chestnut Hill Baptist Church on Route 102, on a hill framed by rustling dark woods that harbor their own uneasy mystery. The death certificate says that Mercy Brown went to her grave at age 19 on Jan. 17, 1892, a victim of tuberculosis. The legend says she was a vampire.
The secret lies buried in Historical Cemetery No. 22, behind Exeter's Chestnut Hill Baptist Church on Route 102, on a hill framed by rustling dark woods that harbor their own uneasy mystery. The death certificate says that Mercy Brown went to her grave at age 19 on Jan. 17, 1892, a victim of tuberculosis. The legend says she was a vampire.
New England vampires? Folklore battled a genuine specter
Written By JOHN CASTELLUCCI
Every Halloween, Rhode Islanders tell the story of Mercy Brown: How she was stricken by a mysterious illness more than 100 years ago and followed her mother and sister to the grave. How her brother Edwin fell ill, too, and their father was persuaded that Mercy was a vampire who was rising from the dead to feed on Edwin's flesh. How old George T. Brown and some neighbors in Exeter dug up her body one wintry March day and found that it had shifted in the coffin. How her heart was burned on a rock after it was found to contain fresh blood. However Edwin was fed the ashes as a cure but died less than two months later, on May 2, 1892.
Every Halloween, Rhode Islanders tell the story of Mercy Brown: How she was stricken by a mysterious illness more than 100 years ago and followed her mother and sister to the grave. How her brother Edwin fell ill, too, and their father was persuaded that Mercy was a vampire who was rising from the dead to feed on Edwin's flesh. How old George T. Brown and some neighbors in Exeter dug up her body one wintry March day and found that it had shifted in the coffin. How her heart was burned on a rock after it was found to contain fresh blood. However Edwin was fed the ashes as a cure but died less than two months later, on May 2, 1892.
Mercy Brown vampire incident
The Mercy Brown vampire incident, which occurred in 1892, is one of the best documented cases of the exhumation of a corpse in order to perform certain ritual activities, such as the conduct of 'magical' rites, supposedly for the purpose of banishing an undead manifestation.
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